Waiting and Running
by martianfairy
Summary: Rey was waiting before she saw Finn for the first time, back when he was still FN-2187. She spent most of her life waiting. When she saw him, for once she was running. A little backstory fic from Rey's side of the story.


"They're coming. They're coming. They're coming. Tonight." Rey whispers, alone but for the moonlight soaked sand and mud huts. The backstreet she occupies is empty and well lit, though by no means safe. For an instant she thinks she sees a shadow putter past and tightens the grip on her staff, but nothing ever comes to get her. It's just a torch, flickering in the wind.

She has done this every night for as long as she can remember. Waiting. Hoping.

Is she insane? Talking to herself, looking for a family that could be. . .that she can only remember glimpses of? She doesn't think so. Everyone has to wait for something, and this is her something. If not this, then what? There is no future on Jakku, and she has no reason to believe there could be one anywhere else.

She has heard things, of course. Myths, legends about knights that exist just to fight the monsters, people who can control light and darkness itself. . . Luke Skywalker.

But myths aren't real and the monsters certainly are. Her family is somewhere in-between myth and monster, real but not really.

 _Yes, really. You remember when they left. You remember._

Rey closes her eyes, drawing her face up to the stars, feeling the almost cool night air. Trying not to forget. She senses that there is more out there—feels a murmur of it inside her.

Somehow, she isn't alone.

Her eyes stay closed for as long as she feels it is safe, and when she opens them she stares out into the distant planets and galaxies and universes. It's almost as if she can see past them into whatever comes next.

It's time. An inhale works its way across her chest and her eyes flash left and right. She needs to return home. The streets are like a magnet for scum and thieves, not that she owns anything of value. . . except herself, and she has learned that on Jakku people can be stolen too.

She begins to turn around, shifting her weight off her staff, moving her attention from the sky to the real world. Before she can turn completely she see's it.

A moving star. She quickly realizes that it's a ship, which is not terribly interesting, but it does give her an excuse to wait longer. She never really wants to return to her place. That's what it is, a place, not a home.

And then a whole galaxy is moving, and growing, and coming right at her.

"A star fleet," she states, detached, whether from shock or fear she doesn't know.

By the time she gets the words out, the ships are landing, much too close to the village. She can't say anything else to herself or even curse because the sound of engines beats all the other sounds into silence.

So she just runs.

The fastest route home cuts right down the middle of the huts, but she can't risk that much exposure. Instead, she goes for a weaving path through alleyways and around the outskirts of the cluster of buildings.

It doesn't take long for the rest of the village to catch on to what's going on, but most of the inhabitants don't have a destination. Their home is in the village. They just stand there, or occasionally run in circles, and a very few actually try to evacuate. No matter where they're going, they seem to be in Rey's way.

She hears the sound of blasters firing in the distance, and pushes past an Aqualith that is pointing and yelling in his native tongue. From there it's a contest, her against the world, against her own body, against the stormtroopers.

She's over halfway there now, and beginning to think maybe she can make it. Flames crush everything behind and even around her, but she dodges them. It's as hot as daytime now, and feels harsher without her desert gear on.

She vaults over an abandoned vendor's stand with her staff, rounds a corner and—

Runs straight into a wall of stormtroopers.

Rey mutters something even she can't hear and wheels around, miraculously dodging blaster fire and darting behind the nearest building.

 _You'd think with all that training they could aim a bit better._

The only other way to her hideout will be down the central street, unless she wants to go all the way back where she came from and around the other side of town, which is probably just as dangerous.

She takes a deep breath and leaps towards the street, opening her stride and not daring to look behind her. Her eyes are watery now from the smoke and heat, which makes it a lot harder to distinguish safe paths from deadly ones. As she goes, she does her best to blink away all the debris—rubbing will only make it worse. She knows from experience.

It isn't enough. She runs straight into something hard and stiff, enough to knock her of her feet.

She squints up to see what she hit, not able to stop dread from creeping into her heart and making it beat faster than lightspeed.

It is exactly what she had feared. A stormtrooper. Helmet directed straight at her, gun at he ready, a claw of blood streaking across where his eyes would be. Rey's eyes flitter from the gun to the blood. Her brow darkens.

She will not become his war paint, or battle trophy, or whatever disgusting glorification of death he intends that mark to mean. She won't let it happen.

She grasps her staff from the ground, preparing herself to move and move quickly.

Before she has the chance, the stormtrooper leaves as abruptly as he had come.

In a moment of insight that washes over her like a wave, Rey realizes that maybe killing doesn't always turn you into a killer. Maybe it forces you to see what death is, and live with the fact that you caused it.

She brushes herself off and keeps running.


End file.
